White Shirt, Black Shirt
by tarnished glitter
Summary: Um.. really hard to describe. It's basically all symbolism, about Duo's life as a child, and how he changes as an adult. Implied 1x2, but it's very slight and easy to overlook like if you don't like that pairing.


A/N: I've had this idea for a while, but, until tonight, never really had the inspiration to sit down and write it out. I guess I'm sort of happy with it. It's a little weird.. but that's what I like. :P

* * *

Life on the streets was hard. You ate what you stole, and slept where you broke in. You wore what you could find, and there were no change of clothes.

You dressed in a white tee-shirt, the flimsy garment Solo had 'lifted for you a little over a year ago. It was dirty, stained, torn, and a size too small – but you loved it anyway, and would have chosen it over any designer shirt, had you happened to come across one. You wore it proudly, the imperfections symbolic of memories, times of laughter and joy, of tears and despair. The little hole in the shoulder where you had gotten caught under the fence running away from the Matthews' doberman, the orange splotch where Dana had spilled Minute Maid fruit juice onto your lap, the tiny specks of blood spattered on as Solo, sick and feverish with the plague, had clung onto you and coughed for the very last time. They were like a scrapbook, these flaws in the shirt. Good times or bad, you needed to remember.

Throwing it away was like tossing out the memories, the myriad of unique events that made up your life. When you admitted this to Sister Helen as she closed the lid on the trashcan, she only laughed. Took your hand in her own and said, "But it is a good thing, my Duo. You'll be starting with a clean slate. After all, I'm sure you don't want to remember those things, all the suffering you must have gone through."

But you did.

You understood her true meaning, however. _She_ didn't want to think about it. Did not want to admit that you had, indeed, "suffered." And you didn't miss the implied threat lurking in an otherwise innocent statement: Starting with a clean slate. You were to remodel yourself. No longer the street rat, no longer the rebel, but a well-behaved young boy, just like the rest of the children in the orphanage.

Deep down, you knew that you were not like those kids. Boring, quiet, obedient. This was not you, and you never wanted it to be. But you understood that you had an obligation to this woman who had taken you in, given you shelter and food and a bed to sleep in, so you did the best you could.

After the church burned down, the blazing flames taking the lives of everybody you had grown to love, you decided that you would make it your mission to become the boy Sister Helen and Father Maxwell had always wanted you to become. And you would avenge their deaths.

Not long after the tragedy, you took to wearing a preacher's shirt – black, of course. Because it hid the stains.

Now it is years later, and you are very much a grown man. Your friends – Heero, Wufei, Trowa, Quatre – had assumed that as you matured, you would discard of the old preacher's garb. After all, you had found other people who loved you, and who you treasured in return. What need was there to cling so desperately to the memories of that kind old woman and noble man?

In a way, they were right. You did stop wearing that age-old shirt, started dressing in other materials and designs, but you never could bring yourself to dispose of it completely, as Sister Helen had done with your white tee-shirt. So it hung quietly, inconspicuously, in the back of your closet, far away from your regular wardrobe and Heero's prying eyes.

You know that he is worried.

Because you still wear black. Only now the dark fabric covers the stains of your soul. Long, bony arms covered with an endless trail of scars, now these have become your scrapbook. But you are not proud anymore, and more than anything, you don't want to remember.

You are quiet, keep to yourself, endure the pain in silence, because you know in your heart that Heero wouldn't _want_ to the truth if he had any idea what really lurked beneath the surface.

Keeping the sleeves of your black shirt rolled down, you sweat in the suffocating heat of summer, look away from the questioning eyes that always seem to find you.

Drowning in your own tears, the little droplets do not show on the dark fabric as they drip lazily down your cheeks and onto your shirt.

Dirty with memories of crimes committed against you in the past, torn by your own hand, the razor that sliced so easily through already-scarred flesh, and tainted because you just could not forget.

Cheerful and smiling, nobody needs to know what that shirt is covering up.

You have become the man Sister Helen never knew she didn't want you to be.

* * *

End notes: Yeah, it's all symbolism. But I think the meaning is pretty obvious. 


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